There is a delightful roll in Birmingham Public Library, not like those massive lesson-books called in the Record Office, “Recusant Rolls,” “Coram Rege Rolls,” etc., but a little roll, not six inches in breadth, and not very long, though it records notes on the history of Coventry during three hundred years.
It is entered in the Catalogue of Warwickshire MSS. as “No. 115,915. Citizens of Coventry with right to wear swords, 1352-1650.” Though this can hardly be called incorrect, it is, as a title, certainly incomplete and misleading; for the little roll is a list of the Bailiffs or Mayors of Coventry during that period. Very often it is only a bare list, and as none of the names of the office-holders are very striking, I did not transcribe them altogether, finding a lack of consecutive interest in a string of mere names.
But against some of these names are remarks, records of the most notable events of the year of each man’s mayoralty, or what the writer took to be such. I am not about to discuss the position or office of the writer, or even to attempt to fix the exact date at which the roll was written, if it did not grow through the ages. It is at least old. But the writer seems to have been a selector and a copyist, because he is not certain in the reckoning of the regnal years, and generally renders them as a year too late. I give here the double date of the years of a mayoralty. I am only about to record those remarks which can, in general, be understood in the light of contemporary history, and occasionally reflect some light upon its pages.
The Roll begins with a bare list of names from 1352. The first which is annotated is:
1403-4, John Smither. In this year a Parliament was held at Coventry....[99]
1405-6, William Attleborrowe. In his year the Commons of Coventry rose....
1406-7, John Boutener. Ther was the pauement made in the city....
1412-3, John Horneby. Hee arrested the Prince in the city of Coventry....[100]
1423-4, Henry Peytoe. The Crosse was beegunn in the Cross Cheaping his yeare.
1424-5, Thomas Walgraue. This yeare the hermite preached in the King’s parke, where was a greate audience.